"These dons have unpleasant memories for such little attentions, and here the secret shot or stab usually settles everything; but before we separate, I shall have the honour of showing you the direct path to the head-quarters of De Saldos, after which, you must look to your pistols and put your trust in Providence. I shall keep your secret, and if there is any other way in which I can serve you, command me." "I thank you; but I hope that to-night, or to-morrow morning at latest, will see my face turned towards Portugal, for I long to rejoin my corps." "The fugitives of my party will spread a calamitous report concerning me in Valencia, and my father, the poor old general, will suppose that I am lying shot on the mountains, instead of holding this pleasant _tête-à-tête_ with one of the sacré Anglais over the comfortable contents of his canteen," said Ribeaupierre, laughing. "What a droll world it is!" "And your mother--I think I heard you mention your mother. She----" "Happily will know nothing about it, as she is with Joseph's court. She is a gentle and loving creature, with a heart all tenderness. Ah, the seat of war, would never do for her, and, ma foi! it doesn't suit me either. It was not willingly I became a soldier, be assured; and yet, now that I am fairly in for it, and have won my epaulettes and cross, I should not like to find myself a mere citizen again. Peste! I shall not in a hurry forget the night on which, by a great malheur, a great mistake, I was forced to become a soldier." "Mistake--how?" asked Quentin, smiling at the young Frenchman's gestures and energy. "Mon camarade, a man says more when under the influences of eau-de-vie, or champagne, than he ever does under those of vin-ordinaire, cold water, or a bowl of gruel; and, as your remarkably potent rum-and-water has put me in that condition when a man reveals his loves and hates, and, more foolish still, sometimes his private history, I don't care if I tell you how I became a soldier. "My father," began the garrulous chasseur, "is an officer of the old days of the monarchy, and held his first commission, like the Emperor himself, from Louis XVI., the Most Christian King, and they were brother subalterns in the regiment of La Fere. To the friendship that grew up between them there, the old gentleman owes his brigade and the Grand Cross of the Legion, quite as much as to his own bravery in Germany, Italy, and Flanders. My mother (or she at least whom I have been taught to call my mother, for she is his second wife,) was a widow of rank, who lost her whole possessions in the stormy days of the Revolution. She was without children, and when my father was assisting the Little Corporal to play the devil at Toulon, Arcola, Lodi, Marengo, and elsewhere, she most affectionately took charge of me, and of my education in Paris.